What would you share with your doctor? People are sending photos of rashes on a diverse array of body parts to their doctors for advice or a diagnosis in a new practice known as “telemedicine,” The Guardian reported.
The American Academy of Dermatology requires secure networks, high-quality imaging and for doctors to have worked with patients before telemedicine can be used.
Many questions have been raised about the nature of using telemedicine with sensitive pictures. Lois Shepherd, health ethicist at the University of Virginia, told The Guardian, “Obviously, we are concerned about situations where boundaries are breached and where people are sending their photos in a way to create an improper relationship between a healthcare provider and patient, minor or not minor.”
Proponents of telemedicine say there is nothing wrong with this practice, so long as the pictures are not sexual in nature.
With the rise of telemedicine, people need to remember that a nice in-person visit to the doctor’s office can go a long way.
If patients really want a solution, they should see a doctor. A minor rash could turn out to be something much more severe when it’s being evaluated in person instead of on an iPhone. Sometimes doctors ask questions totally unrelated to the task at hand and find a different problem with a patient. Text is a one-dimensional way to look at multi-dimensional problems.
More than dealing with rashes, diagnosing health problems via texting can further patients’ misdiagnoses under the guise of facilitating a solution. Lying about a fever is easy to do when nobody is taking a person’s temperature. It’s easier for a doctor to tell when a patient is lying when the patient is in front of them.
Not every observable detail will be covered in a picture with a two-sentence description. This is the one aspect of millennials’ lives that wouldn’t be improved by efficient technological intervention. It’s a very millennial characteristic to text someone for immediate relief. Nobody wants to go into a doctor’s office for two seconds and be told exactly what they expected to be told.
The patient’s relationship with the doctor should also be taken into consideration before making some texting choices. Though the AAD requires doctors to have met with patients once before, it’s easier on the doctor to be pretty fond of whoever sends them pictures of strange rashes.
A doctor’s boundaries, in another sense, need to be clearly outlined with the patient before they receive a graphic text. As much as they should love helping people, doctors can’t be on call 24/7.
On the other side of the argument, texting may encourage an entire reluctant group of people to investigate serious problems they otherwise wouldn’t have taken the trouble to schedule an appointment for.
Telemedicine also has the potential to be used as a money-saving mechanism. Patients need to have previously met with the doctor to use telemedicine, but future visits to the doctor’s office could be cut down if communication, and frequent communication, is limited to mostly text message exchanges. Imagine if someone only saw their doctor a handful of times over the course of their lifetime. What a lifetime that could turn out to be.
The shady part comes when doctors receive pictures of genitalia with inquiries about a rash there. Pictures sent via text are never truly deleted, and trusting even a doctor with a nude picture is a difficult thing to do. Doctors are professionals, but just sending a private picture makes it potentially available for the world to discover.
When someone texts a photo, it’s never just to one person. The cloud is a mysterious entity. Nobody’s sure just how it works. It’s not safe to leave personal photos floating up there. Anything is possible in the cloud.
Maybe in the future, when phones come outfitted with fancy scanners, doctors can accurately figure out what’s going on without meeting a patient. But until then, it’s on patients to take the initiative to care about their health. And to give doctors some space.
